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Spanish Republican philosophers in exile defended the Second Republic, legally proclaimed on April 14, 1931. They embraced the anti-fascist cause rising in the 1920s and the 1930s in Europe. During the Civil War, which lasted three years, they stood among the people. 1939 saw the victory of General Francisco Franco, supported by Nazi Germany and the Italy of Mussolini. Threatened with death, they had no choice but to escape from Spain. Some intellectuals experienced French concentration camps but, for the most part, they found refuge in Latin America, especially in Mexico and Venezuela. In exile, they swore to remain loyal to the Second Republic and to the spirit of the Spanish people.
Moved by liberal views and humane ideals, these philosophers belonged to the vanquished, as those everywhere in Europe who rose against Fascist barbarity. As a result, their respective works are still widely unknown today – despite relentless efforts made to promote their thought to a larger audience for over half a century.
In addition to the historical context of crisis during the interwar period, the situation of Spanish philosophy itself is suggestive. Indeed, Spanish philosophy was institutionalised at the beginning of the twentieth century only: the Schools of Madrid and Barcelona were created. These politics of cultural and intellectual renovation are first bestowed upon the generation of philosophers I study, born in the 1900s. When the Spanish War erupts, they had become professionals of international recognition. This shows the actual limits of academic philosophy, incapable of acknowledging unorthodox ways of philosophising.
The experience of exile itself serves in my opinion as a catalyst: Spanish Republican philosophers in exile seek emancipation from academic conventions to philosophise freely; that is, in Spanish and according to the spirit of the people. No doubt “poetic reason” – the true invention of Spanish Republican exile – stems from this ideal of autonomous thinking.

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